Spring Break Arrests Near Total For 1985

FORT LAUDERDALE — By tonight -- with at least four weeks of Spring Break still to go -- arrests are likely to eclipse the total that police made during last year`s invasion.

The prediction Monday by Capt. Ed White, commander of law enforcement on the beach, came after a weekend in which there were more than 200 Spring Break- related arrests. As of Monday, the arrests since Feb. 21 tallied 830, while last year there were 889 arrests for all of Spring Break.

``It was a busy weekend,`` said White. ``Sunday night was as busy as I`ve ever seen it.``

Arrests are up this year, thanks in part to new laws banning drinking in the beach area or in cars. White said violations of those laws will account for about 20 percent of the arrests this year.

Over the weekend, the infractions that brought arrests ranged from alcohol violations to disorderly conduct to urinating in public -- which in some instances meant urinating right next to portable toilets or in the parking lot of the police substation on the beach.

``It was the usual run-of-the-mill problems,`` White said.

For David H. Dupont, 22, of West Palm Beach, an arrest for an open container violation wasn`t so run-of-the-mill after he was taken to the substation to be booked.

According to police reports, Dupont was arrested in front of the Candy Store lounge on State Road A1A after he refused to pour out a cup of beer. Police said that plastic ``flex cuffs`` were placed on Dupont`s wrists and he was placed in a holding cell at the beach substation to await processing and transporting to jail.

Inside the holding cell, police said, Dupont slipped a safety razor out of his wallet and asked another prisoner to cut off his plastic cuffs. Once he was free, Dupont passed the razor to other prisoners in the holding cell, police said.

When Sgt. McKinley Smith went into the cell to retrieve one of the prisoners, he ``found several subjects with their flex cuffs cut also,`` Smith said in a report.

No one escaped, but Dupont was charged with carrying a concealed weapon and aiding escape, according to records. White said procedures for handling people arrested on misdemeanors and placed in the holding cells have been changed in order to avoid a similar incident again.

The large number of arrests left holding cells in the city`s jail crowded as well, and detention officials working furiously to keep up with the pace during the weekend.

``We would just get one person processed and out of here and another would be brought in,`` said Detention Lt. John Ianno.

Most of those arrested in the beach area are charged with misdemeanors and quickly bail out of jail, so that while the cells were not overcrowded, the holding cells remained full and detention officers busy with paperwork, said Ianno.

``A cooperative person takes about 15 minutes to process,`` he said. ``And then you have your uncooperative ones who take longer.``